


Collaboration

by h_smythe



Category: 13 Reasons Why (TV)
Genre: Gay, High school boys, M/M, hookup, makeout
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-29 04:22:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11433072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/h_smythe/pseuds/h_smythe
Summary: In which Tony Padilla and Ryan Shaver have their first encounter.This takes place before the show begins, and is an imagined backstory for Tony and Ryan's relationship that we learn took place in Episode 8 (after hints in Episode 5).This is my first thing on here, hope you all enjoy! I'd love to hear feedback if you have any :)





	Collaboration

_(a visual aide lifted from this excellent page: http://worldofwonder.net/boys-13-reasons-acting-lovey-dovey/)_

*  
  
In the locker room after gym class, as Tony pulls his sweaty shirt off, Ryan Shaver walks by on his way to the showers with a towel wrapped around his slim waist. When Tony glances up at him on his way past, Ryan pointedly looks over and eyes Tony up and down, lingering on his bare chest and abs, tracing along Tony’s tattoos. Ryan raises a single eyebrow and a gentle smirk appears before he turns his face away. After he’s gone, Tony lifts his eyebrows and shakes his head slightly, marvelling a little at Ryan’s boldness. The guy certainly doesn’t hold back. Tony finds the corners of his mouth turning up in a small, involuntary smile. He turns back to his locker and continues to get himself ready for his next class.  
  
*  
  
“For this project, you’ll be working in pairs. Your job is to come up with a written analysis of the three chapters together. Once you’ve completed the analysis, I’d like you both to write a separate, one page reflection on the process of collaboration, exploring the roles that you each took in the process, what you found challenging, what worked well, what you would want to do differently next time. In the first part, the collaborative analysis portion, I’m looking for clarity of thought, and references to themes and materials that we’ve looked at in class discussions. The point of this project is more about figuring out what it means to work closely with someone else and what the difficulties are in that process, than it is about coming up with anything particularly polished—that being said, please make sure to spell- and grammar-check. By junior year I expect your writing to at least meet a basic standard of correctness.”  
  
Ms. Hawkins is standing at the front of the class glancing down at the clipboard in her hands as she speaks.  
  
“Since part of this is about experiencing the unfamiliar and challenging yourselves, I’ve made up the pairs myself, with the goal of getting you to try working with someone new.” Muffled groans of protest come from the students, but Ms. Hawkins continues on as if she hasn’t heard the reaction. “… I think the process will be more interesting for everyone that way. So, here they are: Emily and Jason. Veronica and Sarah. Becky and Sam. Clay and Courtney. Sheri and Jeremy. Tony and Ryan…”  
  
Tony looks up as Ryan turns in his seat a couple of rows ahead of him and locks eyes with him. That smirk again—or maybe it’s just the way that he smiles? Always a little condescending. Tony nods in acknowledgement and then turns back to his books.  
  
*  
  
As Tony is packing his books into his bag at the end of English, Ryan appears next to his desk.  
  
“Well howdy, partner,” he drawls with playful sarcasm.  
  
Tony presses his lips together in a polite part-smile. “Hey, Ryan.”  
   
Tony zips his bag and slings it over his shoulder, and Ryan casually begins to inspect his nails. “You know, usually I think group work is total bullshit—” he says lightly, “—but this particular project doesn’t actually sound so bad. Interesting, even, maybe.” On the last word, Ryan lifts his eyes and meets Tony’s. Tony nods in noncommittal agreement and hooks his thumbs into his jeans pockets. He stands, shifting his weight and waiting for Ryan to say whatever he’s there to say. He glances at the other students filing out of the class.  
  
“Have you finished reading the chapters yet?” Ryan asks.  
  
“Mostly, yeah,” Tony replies.  
  
“Alright, well if you want,” Ryan says, trailing a finger along the surface of Tony’s desk, “we could get started tonight. We can work at my house; my mom’s cooking is probably the only thing about her that I don’t feel justified criticizing, so. You’ll get a good dinner out of it, if nothing else.”  
  
Ryan lingers over those last three words, and in spite of himself, Tony finds his eyes drawn to Ryan’s finger as it draws its lazy pattern across the desk.  
  
_Bet that desk is feeling pretty good right now_.  
  
“Well?”  
  
Tony looks up and Ryan is grinning in a self-satisfied way, watching Tony watch him. Ryan folds his arms across his chest and cocks an eyebrow.  
  
“Uh, yeah—sure,” Tony replies, after a too-long pause, and he curses himself silently and vehemently in Spanish as he feels the heat creeping up his neck, knowing that this blush will not escape Ryan’s attention. Sure enough, a glint enters Ryan’s eye as his gaze moves over Tony’s cheeks, neck, and collarbone; Tony ignores the glint, and pushes on, tone deliberately casual. “After school?”  
  
“Mhmm. Meet you in the parking lot. You’re driving.” Ryan throws one last, smirky little look over his shoulder at Tony and then walks out of the class. Lagging as he follows behind, Tony’s eyes pause on the surface of his desk as he passes by. He pictures a finger trailing down his stomach and the hair on the back of his neck stands up. A faint hum of nervous anticipation begins to buzz in his chest.  
  
*  
  
When Tony gets to the parking lot Ryan’s already standing next to his Mustang expectantly. For a few seconds after Tony spots him, Ryan is still staring off to the side, and Tony notices the way that Ryan’s face looks when he isn’t arranging it into an attitude of smugness: this unselfconscious face is gentler, more thoughtful. Kind of beautiful. Just as this realization hits Tony, Ryan catches sight of him. He raises an eyebrow, and smirks. Again. God _damn_ does this guy work hard to come off cocky.  
  
*  
  
Tony follows Ryan in through the front door, taking in the home’s tidiness, its multitude of clean beige surfaces, with a total lack of surprise. _Rich white people_. He pictures his father walking into this house, and can see in his mind’s eye with such distinct clarity the sneer on his face, the way he would shake his head. But who is he kidding: his father would never be invited into one of these houses. Tony has been in enough of them over the years to know how to hide his own feelings about the glaring discrepancies between this kind of home and the ones in his neighbourhood.  
  
A tall, slender woman with grey hair pinned elegantly into a bun emerges from the kitchen ahead of them, wiping her hands on a dish towel. At first glance she and Ryan share an almost startling resemblance: Ryan’s height, build, and angular features are clear echoes of her own. But her expression is gentle and tentative enough to nearly erase the similarity between them. Next to her son’s sharp haughtiness she gives off the impression of something sweet and soft. It’s a bit jarring to see them next to each other, strange distorted reflections of one another.  
  
“Hi sweetheart,” she greets Ryan, and he leans over to kiss her on the cheek, a gesture that obviously comes naturally, and which Tony finds himself surprised by.  
  
“This is Tony,” Ryan says. “We got assigned to work on a collaborative chapter analysis together, so we’re getting a head start. Can he stay for dinner?”  
  
“Yes of course,” she says warmly, turning to Tony. “Nice to meet you, Tony. Do you eat fish?”  
  
“Yes, thank you, Mrs. Shaver.”  
  
“Oh, call me Marilyn,” she replies with a smile as she turns back toward the kitchen. “We’ll eat at seven, alright Ryan?”  
  
“Mhmm.” Ryan is already moving up the stairs, and Tony shrugs off his jacket and hangs it carefully on one of the silver hooks lining the hallway before following him. That buzz in his chest is getting louder. He pulls his breath in slowly and wills himself to keep steady.  
  
*  
  
Ryan had gotten a second chair from his father’s study, and now the two of them are sitting side by side at the wide antique wooden desk in Ryan’s bedroom. Tony pictures Ryan sitting here making his little zine, pretending he’s some kind of modern-day literary genius. And then he catches himself at the thought, and shakes his head a little to try to clear it away. _You’re just as judgmental as he is, pendejo, sitting here criticizing him in your head for no reason_. He forces himself to refocus on the book in front of him. Ryan’s got his copy open and is tapping a pencil against the page absent-mindedly.  
  
He glances over at Tony. “So, did you have a favourite part?”  
  
“… Favourite part?” Tony asks, clearing his throat.  
  
Ryan doesn’t quite roll his eyes, but his voice does it for him. “… Of the chapters?”  
  
Tony searches in his mind for something to say about what he’d read last night after he’d finished some late work for his dad in the garage. He’d been half-asleep when he’d started and it occurred to him that he’d actually nodded off with the book on his chest. “Uh, nothing really stands out…”  
  
This time Ryan does roll his eyes and his voice has a hint of impatience in it. “Okay, well, I liked the way that chapter 7 explored the concept of uncertainty…” He starts flipping back through the book until he lands at the spot he’s looking for and plants his finger on the text. Tony watches Ryan’s profile as he reads.  
  
“Here, this part… ‘A person who asks a question lives three separate lives of uncertainty. First, there is one whole life before the question is even asked, the uncertainty hingeing upon the existence of the question itself: will it make its way past the lips that wish to speak it?’” Ryan casts a covert glance at Tony before continuing, and Tony furrows his eyebrows, wanting to cut through the literary jargon and get to the point. “Second: there is another lifetime of uncertainty for the questioner once the words have been spoken, when the question hangs in the air between the one who has asked and the one who might answer—or might not. Finally, the third lifetime of uncertainty comes once the answer to the question has been given. This uncertainty is the most complex of the three, because unlike the previous two, this one has no clear end point. There is no act with which to cut it off. It is the uncertainty that lingers after the answer has been delivered, because the reasonable questioner must always doubt—if an answer is indeed provided—whether or not the answer given is, in fact, the truth.’”  
  
Ryan lets this hang in the air for a moment before he lifts his gaze back up to Tony’s, and Tony reads some kind of challenge in his sharp blue eyes. Tony returns the look steadily.  
  
Glancing back down at the text, Ryan says with a studied offhandedness, “I mean, that’s pretty poignant, don’t you think? All those layers of not knowing. First you don’t know if you can actually ask the question. Then you don’t know if you’ll get an answer. And finally when you do, even then, there’s no way of knowing whether the person giving you your answer is lying.”  
  
“Isn’t that what lie detectors are for?” Tony responds, an edge of sarcasm coming in. Ryan makes a disgusted sound in the back of his throat and, for the second time in less than ten minutes, rolls his eyes. It crosses Tony’s mind that if Ryan had ever spent any time with Tony’s father, that habit would not have lasted.  
  
“Have you not heard the Radiolab where they debunk polygraph machines? Lie detectors are total bullshit, a tool of intimidation with no scientific basis. And besides, you’re entirely missing the point of the passage. It’s about how people hide things, from themselves and each other. All the fucking time.” He threw a pointed look at Tony.  
  
Tony shakes his head slightly and lets out an impatient sigh. “You got something you wanna ask me, Ryan?” he throws back at him.  
  
Immediately, the question shoots out of Ryan’s mouth. “Are you gay?”  
  
Without hesitation, Tony replies, simply, “Yes.”  
  
For an instant Ryan looks nonplussed by Tony’s candour. There is a slight pause as he recovers his composure, and Tony revels a little in the small victory. With great satisfaction he sees some colour appear along Ryan’s cheekbones. Seeing this arrogant asshole flustered is… surprisingly hot. Tony swallows and keeps his breathing steady, holding back the amused smile that wants to creep into his neutral expression: he can’t let Ryan see how much he’s enjoying this. He doesn’t want to give away his upper hand, now that Tony’s managed to catch Ryan off guard.  
  
As if trying to regain his advantage, Ryan follows up with a second question, his tone condescending once again: “Did it make you uncomfortable to be asked that question?”  
  
Tony looks as if he is contemplating the question in an unhurried way and then shakes his head, his eyebrows slightly raised, and replies, “No.” And then, an edge entering his voice, returning the challenge, he adds, “—Does it make you uncomfortable to ask it?”  
  
Ryan gives him a look that is balanced somewhere between withering and playful. “You and I both know that high school isn’t exactly a risk-free environment for asking that kind of question. So—yes. It does make me uncomfortable to ask it. I never know what kind of reaction it might provoke.”  
  
Tony nods slowly in acknowledgement, this response undeniably reasonable. For the first time, the conversation feels something like an honest exchange, and it occurs to Tony that Ryan’s ice queen act is probably just a necessary defence mechanism. After all, with Ryan’s mannerisms being so unsubtly queer, he hasn’t got much else to hide behind.  
  
A silence stretches out in between the two of them, sitting next to one another facing their books on the desk. Tony’s leg starts to jiggle involuntarily, and he forces it into stillness, then restlessly reaches forward for his copy of the text, beginning to rifle through the pages. He stops on a page that he remembers as the one he read before he fell asleep last night, and points at a paragraph with his pencil.  
  
“I didn’t really get this whole part,” he says, making an effort to refocus on the work, unsure of where to go in the other conversation that had sprung up between them. “This whole thing about  free will or whatever? ‘Is it a choice that is being made, or are all the choices in fact already laid out before us? Can it be said to be free will, if the being with the will has never truly been free?’ What the fuck is that, I mean that’s barely even English.”  
  
Ryan has begun to tap his pencil impatiently against the edge of the desk. He fully ignores Tony’s attempt to reinitiate with the homework and instead plows forward insistently with his own line of questioning. “Why haven’t you ever come to any of the Gay/Straight Alliance meetings at school? They’re always announced. You knew they were happening.”  
  
Groaning internally at the continued grilling and at Ryan’s accusatory tone, Tony swallows his irritation and forces a casual shrug. “It’s just not my kind of thing,” he says with purposeful lightness.  
  
“Why not?”  
  
_Fucking persistent, this guy_.  
  
Tony sighs, lifts his gaze toward the ceiling, wondering what kind of answer would actually satisfy Ryan. What does he want to hear? “Listen, Ryan, I’ve got nothing against anybody who goes. Whatever it is that people get out of it, support, affirmation, whatever, that’s fine. It’s great—for them. It’s just not something that I want, or need.”  
  
Ryan fixes him with a disdainful sidelong look. “Right, because you’re _so_ confident and secure in your societally supported role as a sexual and ethnic minority in a largely white, affluent, heteronormative community that you’re above needing support and affirmation.”  
  
Tony just returns his gaze and shrugs.  
  
Ryan sighs and persists: “What about community? Or do you not need that either.”  
  
“I got plenty of community where I’m from, believe me.”  
  
“I mean _queer_ community, _ob_ viously.”  
  
Tony pauses, takes a breath, and with a patience that hides his growing frustration (and his barely withheld impulse to shake that last eye-roll out of Ryan like his papi would), says, “Look, Ryan, you do what you want with your time—go to those meetings, whatever, if that’s what you want. But it’s not what I want. Okay?” He turns his head and meets Ryan’s gaze directly with a level stare.  
  
Ryan’s tone is suddenly breezy when he echoes, “Okay,” along with a little shrug. Their eyes stay locked, and that feeling of anticipation in Tony’s chest is suddenly there again and keyed up to another level. Looking into Ryan’s eyes, Tony is abruptly aware of how little space there is between them, their side-by-side chairs only a couple of inches apart.  
  
Without breaking eye contact, Ryan raises one eyebrow coyly, and the breath catches in Tony’s throat as he feels a hand slide onto his leg, coming to rest lightly on his inner thigh. He can feel the warmth of it through his jeans. Suddenly Tony’s heart is pounding in a way that he is not at all used to. When he swallows, he watches how Ryan’s eyes follow the motion of his Adam’s apple. Tony’s lets his gaze drift down to where Ryan’s hand is resting, all of his senses gathering around the contact point where Ryan’s palm is pressing against him.  
  
His eyes move slowly back up to Ryan’s face, and as soon they lock again with Ryan’s Ryan says, unsmiling, his voice low, “I _do_ do what I want with my time.”  
  
Again, Tony swallows. Even so, his voice comes out hoarse when he meant it to be nonchalant. “Oh you do, do you?”  
  
Ryan lifts his eyebrows and nods, slightly. Tony has a hard time focusing on Ryan’s face: his fingers are pressing into Tony’s thigh just a little harder.  
  
“And what about you, Tony,” Ryan continues, in that same low, even voice, “what is it that you want to do, with your time?”  
  
Tony leaves the question to hang in the air between them for a beat, and then—slowly, deliberately—he breaks eye contact, drops his eyes to Ryan’s lips, and lets them rest there. He doesn’t move, doesn’t have to; he waits right where he is and watches as Ryan leans forward in his chair and brings his face to Tony’s.  
  
As soon as Ryan’s mouth is against his, Tony is kissing back, the buzz beneath his skin finally breaking to the surface and moving his lips against Ryan’s, moving his hand to reach out and find Ryan’s waist beneath the jean jacket he has on, to press against the soft cotton of the t-shirt covering his skin. Ryan’s hand is still there on Tony’s inner thigh, his fingers now moving subtly, slowly, and Tony can feel himself beginning to get hard inside his jeans. As the fingers teasingly inch closer, Ryan’s mouth opens against Tony’s and just as their tongues find each other Tony lets out an involuntary groan, abruptly breaking the kiss to push his chair back and pull Ryan from his own chair. Ryan lets out a quiet laugh as Tony roughly pulls him down to straddle him, Tony’s hands gripping both of Ryan’s thighs and holding him in place. Their mouths come back together, immediately opening to one another and the kiss deepens, losing any restraint that might have been holding either of the boys back. One of Ryan’s hands is on the back of Tony’s neck and the other finds its way back along Tony’s leg, but this time it keeps moving until it lands on its destination. Tony’s pauses in his kiss and breaths a gasp against Ryan’s mouth as Ryan presses firmly against the bulge in Tony’s jeans. As the hand begins to move Tony groans gently and grips Ryan’s thighs harder, leaning his head down and pressing his mouth against Ryan’s neck. He hears the smile in Ryan’s voice, which comes out in a low, sexy murmur against Tony’s ear. It occurs to Tony that this is a version of Ryan’s voice that he could get used to.  
  
“I’d really like to get you out of these clothes but I think we’d both be more comfortable if we move over to the bed first.”  
  
And then Ryan pulls away and stands, taking a step back from Tony. Tony follows suit and gets up slowly, watching Ryan, who throws a pointed look from Tony to the bed. In turn, Tony glances toward the closed bedroom door.  
  
“What if your mom…?”  
  
“Oh please, you’re not the first boy I’ve brought home. By now she’s well aware of what that closed door means.”  
  
Tony raises his eyebrows in genuine surprise. He can’t imagine how that kind of cavalier attitude would go over in his own household. Or, rather, he can, all too clearly. He chooses to skim right past the comment about the other boys, and instead closes the space between the desk and the edge of Ryan’s bed, turning and sitting down, leaning back on his palms casually. He lifts his eyes and watches Ryan, who watches back from where he is standing, his lips parted. It’s all Tony can do to stop himself from reaching out and pulling Ryan down onto him. Instead, he forces himself to be patient, and to wait for the other boy to come to him. Tony knows this game well enough by now to know that he will.

*


End file.
